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The Pikeman
The Pikeman is a tough piece to understand at first, but he has a point... two actually, if you count the pike. The Pikeman’s attack does 1 damage but his defense action can change that. The Pikeman’s defense action is an interesting one and not just because he gets drunk to achieve it. He raises his attack by 1 but takes double damage while drunk and his movement range gets reduced from 2 to 1 at the same time. The effects of his drunkenness last for either 4 turns or if he gets attacked. Unlike other attack boosts that drop after one use, the Pikeman’s doesn’t, so feel free to stab away repeatedly when drunk! Keep in mind that a Priest shield's effectiveness is not altered by a Pikeman's condition. Whether drunk or not, a Priest shield will act normally, meaning an incoming 2 damage attack (before being doubled) on a drunk Pikeman, would first remove the Priest shield bubble and be left with only 1 attack damage left to be doubled on the now exposed drunken Pikeman. The Pikeman will be left with 2 health after this exchange, not 1. The thing about using a Pikeman is knowing when to be the aggressor and when to play more defensively. If facing off against anything other than a Knight or Shieldmaiden AND the Pikeman can attack the target piece before the target piece can attack it, Pikeman can go on the offensive. The reason for this is simple. Any 2 health piece can be killed by the Pikeman in one turn. As for the 3 health pieces, a Marksman attacked first by a Pikeman is no match for him and a King/Queen is no match for him either regardless of whether he attacks first or second. As for the 4 health Shieldmaiden, due to her shield, the Pikeman is no match for her so he better be backed up by a Priest. Which brings us to a Pikeman facing off against a Knight. When facing off against a 5 health Knight, the Pikeman will need to be a bit more defensive to come out on top. The basic strategy here is to get the Knight to advance on your Pikeman in a way that he has to make a stop 1 space away from your Pikeman before he can move in and attack it on your opponent’s next turn. If you can achieve this layout, you may strike the Knight from 2 spaces away and move 2 spaces back so the Knight cannot reach you for yet another turn. If the Knight continues to advance, your Pikeman would simply repeat the process until the Knight is down to 2 health. At this point, your Pikeman can get drunk and finish the job but don’t get drunk until the Knight is down to 2 health! When drunk, remember that your movement abilities drop by 1 so you won’t be able to escape the Knight and a boosted Knight can kill a 4 health Pikeman in one stab! Of course, keep in mind the Pikeman can finish the job when the Knight is at 3 health if you can manage to boost your drunk Pikeman with your King’s/Queen’s defensive action for a total of 3 damage on the now deceased Knight. Be responsible drinkers! When playing against the Pikeman, a Marksman makes an excellent counter as long as you launch your first attack on the Pikeman from 3 spaces away, not 1 or 2 and continue to keep your Marksman out of range in this way until you have the Pikeman down to 1 health. At that point, you can move closer since your next attack will be eliminating him anyway. If you can start the exchange between the 2 pieces in this way, a Pikeman, by himself, will never manage to reach the Marksman; who can continue to stay out of range while killing off that helpless drunkard. An Executioner can do okay in weakening a Pikeman due to the fact he can reach the Pikeman if the Pikeman can reach him but an Executioner (unless he has gained his blust damage) will always die before the Pikeman 1 on 1 because the Pikeman can always get drunk once the Executioner is at 2 health remaining. If the Executioner managed to attack first, the Pikeman would be left with 1 health but if the Pikeman managed to strike first, he would be left with 2 health while the poor Executioner’s 4 health would already be gone as he lay dead on the floor. The Shieldmaiden is the best counter to the Pikeman because, regardless of whether he manages to attack her first or not, he will never manage to injure a properly played shieldmaiden beyond that 1 health deduction. This is due to the fact that if the Pikeman stays 1 space away, a Shieldmaiden can always follow her “Move, attack, shield.” formula. Further, if you choose to stand your Pikeman next to her and leave her shield untouched, her shield naturally wears out on one of her turns, not one of yours, so she will be able to attack you without having to move or having something else need to break it anyway. You are doomed! Lastly, when using a Knight against the Pikeman, in order to counter the scenario outlined above, you need to either get your King/Queen to boost the Knight’s movement, which would come to 4; or you can jump into tall grass in order to gain +1 movement on your next turn. Just remember that if you attack or are attacked while in the tall grass, you have been discovered and no longer have +1 movement even though you are still standing in tall grass. You do not lose stealth if defensive actions are performed by or on a unit in the tall grass however. Pikeman, like most other ranged units, is not nearly as useful on smaller maps as they are on larger ones. Since all ranked matches are on large maps, he is a piece you will want to get familiar with later, but may not be the best starting choice when you are nowhere near having the 6 units required to access larger maps not to mention 10 units required for a ranked battle. If you drink with the Pikeman after being hit by a Plague Doctor, you will lose the patient buff.